On April 20th, deputy Minister of Defense for Policy and Plans Slaven Galic received representatives of the NATO DEEP team (NATO Defense Education Enhancement Programme) led by dr. Pavel Anastasov, Program Manager for Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) from the NATO headquarters in Brussels and Martin Chovanenc, academic team leader for our country.
At the final meeting at the BiH Ministry of Defense, Deputy Minister Galic welcomed the guests and thanked them for their engagement in supporting the Ministry of Defense and the Armed Forces of BiH (AFBiH) in the process of improving the field of education in our institutions.
He emphasized that the Ministry of Defense and the AFBiH, within their key tasks, have the obligation to build the capacities of the Armed Forces, as a modern system, compatible with NATO and European Union (EU) standards, and in this context, the quality of training and education of our officers and non-commissioned officers is extremely important.
Deputy Minister Galic also said that in the implementation of the DEEP program, measurable progress has already been achieved in the development of instructor staff, non-commissioned officer career education, staff courses and training control documents.
Also, this program greatly contributes to the development and improvement of the work in the department of military courses, the department of foreign languages and career education.
The NATO Team for the DEEP, is visiting the Ministry of Defense and the AFBiH in the period from April 18th to 21st, 2023.
At the end of 2018, BiH became a participant in the NATO DEEP program, which is focused on the revision of non-commissioned officer career courses, English language courses, and the revision of curricula and training of instructors.
This team also includes academic associates from the field of military education of NATO countries.
On the part of our institution, this program is implemented according to functional competencies, and the main activities from this program have been implemented so far in the Command for Training and Doctrine of the AFBiH.
For the purpose of further planning education according to the recommendations of this team, the engagement of leading people from the Ministry of Defense of BiH, especially the Personnel Management Sector, the Policy and Plans Sector and the Joint Staff of the AFBiH, is needed, so this meeting with key personnel of the Ministry of Defense and AFBiH was organized with the aim of animating them to fully support this program.
During the visit, the NATO DEEP Team will meet with representatives of the NATO headquarters in Sarajevo, and they have already held meetings with competent persons from the AFBiH who are responsible for the planning, development and implementation of non-commissioned officer and language courses in the Center for Professional Development (CPR)/ the Command for Training and Doctrine (KoiD) in Travnik and Rajlovac, as well as with representatives of the Administration for the personnel of the Joint Staff of the AFBiH.
Program manager of the DEEP program for BiH, dr. Pavel Anastasov, on behalf of the NATO DEEP team, reported on the program of the visit, presented plans for the next period and identified areas and fields in which more significant involvement of the Ministry of Defense and the AFBiH is needed, and expressed NATO’s determination to support the development and improvement of additional segments of this program in the future, in the security and defense institutions of BiH.
This final meeting was also attended by the deputy commander of the NATO headquarters in Sarajevo, Brigadier Baver Bekiroglu, as well as assistants to the Minister of Defense Zoran Sajinovic, Sead Muratovic, Dzenan Redzo and representatives of the Joint Staff Personnel Administration of the AFBiH, during which opinions were exchanged on the ways, modalities and possibilities of improving these processes in the Ministry of Defense and AFBiH.
